Gen Con 2025 – Chip Theory Games

I have to give props for Chip Theory Games dedication to a nice table presence that is NOT accomplished simply by throwing a lot of plastic minis onto the table. Known for using nice poker chips and custom dice throughout their games, this year is no different with the area-control Wroth and various Elder Scrolls expansions (now with cheese!).

However, they have been expanding into slightly more modest card-based games like this yearโ€™s location battle Fight 5, and another three decks added to their “20-dice and a bunch of cards” game line, 20 Strong. In the 20 Strong Tanglewoods line players navigating the fairytales of Goldilocks, Red Ridinghood, and Snow White.

If you like crowdfunding, hop to the end to see why Chip Theory had all their backers send in their best pet photos for a recent campaign.


Fight 5

Released at Gen Con, Fight 5 is a 2-5 player game of playing cards to locations, with the highest total claiming the cards. Each player has the same deck of 25 cards – duplicates of 2 to 13 and one star card. The game is available in a standard and a deluxe, foiled card version. The game is always set up so that players compete in five areas, two spots directly their right and left hand opponents and one spot in the middle where everyone plays.

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Gen Con 2025 – Capstone and Sanctuary

I was given the chance to have a playthrough at the upcoming โ€œArk Nova – liteโ€ game, Sanctuary. Releasing at Essen this year, it seeks to shorten a game of Ark Nova a bit, but I can attest thereโ€™s still a fair bit of meat on this animal to keep it in middleweight gaming territory.  Continue to the bottom for a tiny Ark Nova (possibly for you) surpriseโ€ฆ.

Sanctuary goes for middleweight class by focusing almost exclusively on the actual zoo animals (well, their enclosures.) Everyone cycles around taking and placing zoo tiles representing animal pens or other buildings (pens come complete .)ย  Players start with a blank zoo player mat with hexagonal spots to place zoo tiles. Players add tiles to their board (slightly less than one per turn) trying to score points by making the best zoo possible. There are goal tiles and bonuses selected each game which can drive players towards specific strategies and can give a few passive upgrades/improvements. The game ends when a player completes every goal, completely fills their zoo map, or (very rare) the draw pile runs out of tiles.

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Dale Yu: Review of Kado

Kado

  • Designer: Antoine Bauzaย ย 
  • Publisher: Pandasaurus
  • Players: 2-5
  • Age: 10+
  • Time: 45 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link:ย 
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Itโ€™s the thought that counts… or not!

The players give, open, and store their gifts. Over the course of the game, each player will work toward building a grid of 12 KADO cards organized into 3 lines and 4 columns. Players score points according to the value, gift type, and ribbon color of each card. The player with the highest score wins the game.

A game consists of 12 rounds.ย  At the beginning of each round, each player receives a new KADO card, which they can use to build their grid. They can challenge the giver (or not) by guessing his/her card and trying to get a better one. Then they place their final card on their grid, placing it in the best way to optimize their points.

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Gen Con 2025 – Asmodee

Befitting its size, Asmodee had a pile of new and upcoming games they were showing off at the convention. In addition to sequels of previous games (Forest Shuffle Dartmoor, Spot it! Catan, LotR Two Towers trick taking game, Battle for Hoth) there were also a few expansions (Marvel Champions: Trickster Takeover, Forest Shuffle: Exploration.) New games spanned the gamut of lightweight games (Star Wars Super Teams, Happy Mochi, The Hobbit: There and Back Again) medium weight (Duel for Cardia, Fried Potatoes, the LEGO Brick Like This) and the more heavyweight Tessen: The Battle for Toshi Ranbo. There was also a nice little diorama of new/upcoming Star Wars minis on display.

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Dale Yu: Review of Gimbap

Gimbap

  • Designer: Roberto Fraga, Yohan Goh
  • Publisher: Korea Boardgames
  • Players: 2-4
  • Age: 8+
  • Time: 15 minutes
  • Amazon affiliate link:ย 
  • Played with review copy provided by publisher

Can you play a game and make food at the same time? You must if you are playing Gimbap.

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Gen Con 2025 – Preview of Clash of Clans: The Epic Raid

Clash of Clans: The Epic Raid is a boardgame that alternates between a simultaneous engine/town building phase followed by an attacking phase – where players earn points rather than permanently damaging their opponents. The boardgame is thematically based aroundย the mobile game Clash of Clans released in 2012. In it, players build up a base, fill it with troops, and then attack other (offline) players in order to steal gold and elixir. Gold is then spent in oneโ€™s base to build defensive structures while elixir is spent to build structures that provide troops for the attacks. Clash of Clans is widely seen as one of (if not the) first phone games to mix online and offline portions of play. It was wildly successful, earning an estimated $1.5 million dollars per DAY in 2015.ย  The game spawned many copycats and is still widely played to this day. At Gen Con, I was given a tour of the game by one of its designers, Eric Lang, who considers it one of his favorite games that heโ€™s designed – after all his playtesting he still loves playing it

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